*Selene*
I rise before Julian, escaping from his bed before he stirs.
His breathing is soft, his lashes against his cheek. He's wrapped around the sheets, his body sleeping as if it belongs to the life I cannot have.
I'm jealous.
Not for being human. But for still believing that life is a line—a line that advances, smooth and unbroken.
Mine is no line.
It's a circle. A mess. A shredded and bloody bow of secrets and blood promises never meant to be untied.
I leave a kiss on his temple, hold it suspended, and then I whisper, "Don't wait for me."
And then I vanish into morning fog.
⟡
Velvet Veins is almost empty when I arrive. The bar during the day is less enticing, a shadow of its former self. The bartender is replenishing bottles of dark spirits on the bar. There are a few strays sleeping in dim booths, their hearts so sluggish I can barely hear them.
I head straight to the back.
Riven's office door is already open a crack.
He looks up as I come near. His jaw tightens. "I heard about Calder."
"Of course you did."
"I also heard you went to the Crimson Court." He leans back in his chair, fingers crossed. "That was stupid."
"I didn't have a choice."
"There's always a choice."
"No," I snap. "Not when you're me. Not when everyone's been keeping things from me about what I am."
His silence is answer enough.
I step forward. "You knew, didn't you?"
He doesn't deny it.
"Why?" I demand. "Why keep it from me?"
"Because the truth doesn't set people like us free," he whispers. "It condems us."
I exhale, shaking. "I want more than legend and myth. I want facts. Names. Answers. What did my mother do?"
Riven gets up and flings open the ancient iron cupboard behind him. He pulls out a bundle of papers and a map—wrinkled, frayed, smeared with age.
"she went to the Eldermire Chapel," he tells me, unrolling the map. "A ruin now. Hidden among trees just beyond Eros. But a sanctum it was, once. Where blood oaths were sworn. Where some believe that Wraithborn still linger."
"Why did she go there?"
"To finalize her bargain," he says. "And perhaps. to leave something behind."
I can feel my throat tightening. "You think she left me a note?"
"I think she was smarter than any of us ever gave her credit for." Riven fixes me with a stare. "To get the whole truth, there you'll see it."
I memorize the map.
I then steal his motorcycle keys.
"Selene—"
But I'm already vanished.
⟡
The woods beyond Eros are not on any map. Not exactly. They stretch like throbbing limbs, too still, too quiet. No birds. No breeze. Only the hum of something ancient, hidden in the ground.
I look for two hours to find the chapel.
It's not a building anymore—only a shattered archway overgrown with black ivy, stone steps disappearing into the dirt like a gullet swallowing light.
I heat a fire in my hand.
Vampires can't do that. Not all of us.
But I'm not all of us.
The fire crackles green and gold as I walk into the darkness.
I catch the smell of ancient magic and desiccated blood. My boots break through fragments of bone, sigils worn into the stone floor. I can feel them humming under my feet, as though they know me.
As though they've been waiting.
There's a chamber at the bottom. Round. Dome-shaped. The walls are covered in carvings—wraiths with blank eyes, figures shrouded in mist, fangs smearing lips.
And in the center, a pedestal.
A single silver locket rests upon it.
I move closer. Fingers run along the chain.
Visions slam into me.
Not memories. Echoes.
My mother's voice. Her fingers. Her tears.
A ritual. A circle of fire. Her blood mixing with something darker. A whispered word in a language I don't know but somehow understand.
"You will protect her," she says, voice trembling. "You will keep her alive."
Another voice answers, not quite human. "The girl is no longer yours. She is ours now. When the blood moves, we will come back."
My knees buckle.
I drop the locket.
It falls on the ground with a delicate ring.
And then—I'm not alone.
⟡
The man steps out of the darkness as if he's been stitched together out of nightmarish dreams and smoke. Not vampire. Not Wraithborn. Something in between.
His skin is white as bone dust. His eyes are all black. No whites, no color. Just emptiness.
"You're early," he says.
My voice barely works. "Who are you?"
"I am what waits." He smiles, and it's like a knife to the senses. "And you are the key."
"I'm not playing your game."
He cants his head. "Then why did you show up here?"
I light another flame in my hand. "To burn the past."
His smile widens. "You can try."
I throw the flame.
It explodes in his chest—and sputters out like a cup of water.
He doesn't blink.
"Your mother tried to outsmart us. But the blood cannot be negotiated with. It remembers. It calls. And now, it stirs."
I run.
I don't look back.
The chapel crashes as I dash, stone splintering, the ceiling caving in.
I barely escape before it crashes to the ground.
When I finally arrive at Riven's bike, I'm trembling.
No safety left. No hiding. Whatever I was fleeing… it's here now.
And it wants me.
⟡
Julian stands on my fire escape when I return to Riven's apartment.
His eyes widen wide when he notices the dirt on my clothes, the blood on my hands.
He opens his mouth to ask—but I just pull him in by the hand.
"I learned what my mother did," I say. "She promised me something. And cursed me."
"What kind of curse?"
I stare him dead in the eye. "They're after me. And if they can't get me… they'll come through you."
He goes stiff. "Then we fight."
You don't know," I spit. "These beasts—they don't fight dirty. They don't kill." They *consume*. They obliterate."
He grips my wrist. "And you think I care? I'm already in too deep. I don't care if the whole bloody hellworld is gunning for me, Selene. I'm not leaving you."
Tears burn at my eyes, burning and useless.
"You're going to get hurt," I breathe.
"So?" He moves in closer. "Then let me get hurt loving you.".
I break.
And then I kiss him like it's the last thing on earth I'll ever do.
⟡
Several hours later, when the world is still and Julian is sleeping next to me, I lie in the dark, looking at the ceiling.
And I feel it.
A pulse.
Not in my chest—but in the air. In the darkness. In the blood.
The prophecy is real.
And it's started.